Friendly, unfriendly US Cities/States

If you traveled or lived in various states within the U.S., where did you find it the most friendly or unfriendly?

For me, the most unfriendly was when we lived in Salem, Massachusetts, north of Boston. The people were very clannish and if you didn’t grow up there, you were treated as a foreigner. I lived there just over one year and never met my neighbors. Not one hello from any of them.

The friendliest was when we lived near Providence, Rhode Island. From the day we moved there the neighbors came over to welcome us and did everything they could to make us feel at home. In the city of Providence, people greeted one another on the streets and the atmosphere was congenial. I attribute that to the large Italian influence. They are in general very friendly and hospitable.

Abe F. March wrote:

For me, the most unfriendly was when we lived in Salem, Massachusetts, north of Boston.

Interesting topic Abe. Have you ever seen the movie "Salem's Lot" by Stephen King? Seriously, I believe it will answer your question .


Out of my three visits to the US, the unfriendliest place I been to would have to be a suburban district of San Bernardino, California. In this particular neighborhood the kids were ultra "rough" if you know what I mean. They threw an egg on my friend's face through the open window of the silver Chevrolet while we was driving, and there was also mean looking rabid dogs on the streets everywhere.

The friendliest place would have to be The Hampton Inn in Tucson, Arizona. We stayed over one night at this place and they was so generous to us, it's unbelievable.

This is going back to my days at university, when I didn't have much money. So my friends and I, we helped ourselves to an overdose of "free" breakfast at this place. I don't use the word "overdose" lightly neither. I was so hungry from the night before... I had about three servings that morning of cereal with Californian raisins and Florida orange juice. My friends had the same and when all the other guests came down for breakfast that morning, they were surprised to find the place empty. The staff of the Hampton Inn were so amazingly friendly, they did not charge us one buck extra! Unforgettable

Of course, I think any small town in Wisconsin. Madison is my favorite city and along with its suburb, Middleton, has received national awards for best places to live. I like the friendship. I like the freedom to be oneself, to play hockey or LaCrosse, take up farming or winemaking, and express all sorts of opinions.

I love the countryside, the woods, the animals, and of course the people.

Carol

12/21/2009

I lived in New York's Chelsea District for 34 years,
it ran from 8th Avenue to 10th Avenue , from 28th Street
to 14th Street. I knew many of the store owners. Now I
live in Santa Fe , New Mexico, population 65,000. When I
first moved here 10 years ago a stranger said hello, I was
stunned. I know all the store owners big and small. People
here are friendly. In New York you don't say hello to
someone unless you know them, many people think your
going to ask them for something, I know I grew up there.

Cheers..Joe

Carol,
what about places you didn't like?

Joe,
I understand your NY experience. I didn't live in the city but worked in it. One just didn't speak to strangers without an introduction.

Ahad,
you had an experience to remember. Funny how the little things make a difference in ones life. Being kind is remembered.

12/21/2009

Abe..

The place I didn't like was Quebec City, Canada.
Once I opened my mouth they thought I was English
and they have an attitude French Only. I was shocked.
Montreal is my favorite city besides I love Cape Cod, I
use to go there for 30 years..


Cheers..Joe

12/21/2009

Don..
I agree with you, there are certain neighborhoods
in New York I never went into , some of these are in
Brooklyn , such as Bedford Styvesant, Brownsville, etc.
very crime ridden....

Cheers...Joe

I've traveled a lot and can not categorize any city as friendly or unfriendly. I met lots of each everywhere.

The South has a rep for friendly, but I don't know where it got it. I lived in Clarkesville, TN for three years and worked in Nashville. I didn't find people different there than anywhere else. Could be because a lot of them were Northern transplants, though, lol.

I think friendliness has a lot to do with how one looks. Attractive people tend to attract "friendly" people. Ugly people are ignored. Doesn't matter what city you're in.

Is that how you measure people, LC? Attractive or ugly?

Ann

No, I am stating the fact that the more attractive a person is, the friendlier everyone around him or her is.

20/20 even did a show about this. They put an attractive woman in a fat suit and showed how strangers reacted to her vs. when she wasn't in it. Night and day. I doubt it would matter what part of the country she was in.

Everybody has some attractive features, I think. It's a matter of looking for them. That, to me, is a part of being friendly.

Ann

Sure, but the more attractive you are, the more friendly people you'll find. lol

You would expect attractive people to attract attention and the unattractive to be ignored, wouldn't you, LC? Misuse of the word attractive, otherwise.

Of course, attractive people might have a winning smile, caring nature or simply be good company. Conversely, unattractive people might be good-looking but a pain to be around.

When I went to graduate school, I learned how to be friendly. I loved people but was pretty introverted. Smiling, looking people in the eye, acceptance even if I did not approve: all pretty basic friendly skills I needed to work on.

One of my greatest professional successes was my training teens in these skills, which brought about a book that was going to be published by a reputable mental health publisher, but was returned after a year. (Oh, how I wished I knew more about contracts, that they were more powerful than letters of promises.) I self-published the book and sold a reasonable amount. In fact, when we took our little mobile self-help book store to conferences, my book, "Helping Skills for Teenagers" was the best seller, and I neither wore a name tag nor told anyone I was the author, although I did market my training course for teens which had a certain following.

Anyway, I got distracted here. We taught the kids friendship, respect, listening skills, and also when to go to an adult or a professional for help when a situation became too much for them to handle. (I actually got a phone call from the homecoming dance one year because of concern for a friend's being suicidal). We also made sure that there were boundaries for any helper when they had to step back and take care of themselves, and we emphasized their working as a team.

So it is with writing. One can have talent and then take courses and improve. That's what happened in social work school. That's what happened with our peer groups for teens.

Sometimes social workers joke that they will go on a plane somewhere and learn the whole life history of the passenger next to them. Wow, I could write many novels of those stories, but then one time I decided I'd heard enough stories and would smile, but bury my head in a book.

Carol

Shelagh wrote:

You would expect attractive people to attract attention and the unattractive to be ignored, wouldn't you, LC?

Sure, which is why it makes asking where people are friendlier difficult to answer. Like everything else, where you stand depends on where you sit.

Although looks can attract or detract on a personal basis, it is the general atmosphere of a place that gives the feeling of friendliness. I would hate to live next to someone who decided to say hello based on how I looked.

I found Calgary, Alberta to be friendly and Toronto, Ontario unfriendly. My looks didn't change. I've lived in places where I felt estranged because I was an American - an outsider. It wasn't how I looked but who I was. Living in a place where race or national origin is not a factor usually means the people are accommodating and friendly.

People in the north are usually considered cold whereas people in the south warm, and they're not talking about the weather.

Abe F. March wrote:

People in the north are usually considered cold whereas people in the south warm, and they're not talking about the weather.

And I, for one, don't know where that comes from. My own experience is that New Yorkers are the friendliest people anywhere, ever. The rudest I ever met were in Italy and Atlanta.

That's the problem with all those good looking Italians -- too much attitude.

YK, the Italians really are a good-looking group, generally speaking, aren't they? I was impressed at how the women clomped about on those cobblestone streets in high-heels. How do they DO that?

I'm kind of with LC on the north/south thing. I think her "attractiveness factor" is more likely to occur in the south, but one could wear that fat suit she mentioned, and if s/he were wearing designer fashions and had properly coiffed hair, s/he would still get the friendly response. Thin and buffed wouldn't help that much if the clothes were bedraggled.

I haven't spent much time in the north, but I didn't find people to be unfriendly when I was there. The servers in the deli in Middletown, NY, where my brother and I got such wonderful Reubens the day before Dave's wedding, were very gracious, and joked about our Texas accent (I didn't think we had one.)

It all depends on what one considers "attractive," I suppose.

My children all agree that Italians are just rude. I have to go by them; I've never been there myself. But the Londoners I met were very friendly, as were the people at the little pub on the Thames where we stopped for lunch - the town where the Cutty Sark was docked.

Ann

I love Italy. I love Italians. They are happy. And they are good looking.

Carol

I love Italian pizzas. I give credit to Italians for inventing such nice food.

To form opinions about places or people from hearsay can be misleading. In addition, visiting a place is different from living there. Tourists on a guided tour often form false impressions of the country and people. How does one get to know the people of a country by staying in a hotel?

I've met people who formed their opinions of the USA by visiting New York City. How many have formed opinions of Europe by visiting a major city of a European country?

Not everyone can travel and gain firsthand experience, but rely on the media or publications for information. That can also be misleading. Media coverage of a place often occurs because something negative happened. Promotional copy about a place highlights the positive.

"The most hazardous of human tendencies is drawing general conclusions from limited information."

We have only taken tours in the past ten years, and they all had either educational or adventurous elements to them.

I loved our travels with young children. They were filled with misconceptions and wonder, and the children also became tourist attractions as blond haired blue eyed children in Japan where they were lined up for pictures by the natives.

We always just ventured out on our own. We followed two local musical groups which was amazing as music brought so many people together.

And then we went around the world, a trip planned by my husband and daughters utilizing drivers and tour guides when the internet strongly suggested it.

My trip was the drive to Alaska, through the wilderness of Canada. Friends tried to change my itinerary to fit in fishing for salmon, but then we would have been sleeping in the wilderness instead of the only motel for 100 miles. I absolutely loved that trip, wrote it up as I have done the others.

One year I read the round the world trip journal for my blind aunt on a tape and her roommate said she played it over and over. Her poor roommate had to listen to my voice which isn't the most pleasant.

Then there was our trip to Abe's small town in Germany a couple of years ago, meeting his wife and his friends.

I wouldn't give up one minute of my travels, except perhaps the lack of toilet paper in Nepal. After arriving in Australia, my daughter checked out the number of rolls of toilet paper in the ladies room at a restaurant and triumphantly returned to our table with the news she had counted seventeen. Sometimes things change in value.

I need to put this in a book. I need to not worry about publication. Just like LC said, I need to get these things in print somewhere before they disappear in my archival abyss. Perhaps the title could be, "How I Learned My Global View.

Carol